The Secret World

[J_C]

http://www.develop-online.net/news/41926/Funcom-lays-off-lead-designer-of-The-Secret-World

Bad news for fans of one of the worst MMOG developers of all time.

Hey Zed! Hey! Fuck you!

Even if you don't like the game, or any of their games, even if the reviews are true, they make solid MMOs. Not groundbreaking (even though I think there are nice things about them), but enjoyable games. Even if a bit flawed. Let's see, Anarchy Online is one of the longest running sci-fi MMOs, Age of Conan had a messy start, but it is still running, TSW had medium to good reviews, has a niche community and further contents are planned. If they are the worst devs in the MMO genre, everything is OK.

 

[Mangoose]

They saved AoC after firing the original lead dev.

 

[Whisper]

Thinked about "no builder/consumer" build.

Also good option is reflect build. Have high defence and deal damage each time you are attacked or defend, also healing each time for each hit.
Or build to focus on builders alone, since we have passive to increase builder damage. Freed slots for consumer can be filled with buffs and utility skills.


p.s. To lovers of locked decks and limited options in character building: you do understand that how many different things you can do with 525 skills and you are allowed to chose any 14 of them at once. Any of them.

 

[SuicideBunny]

http://www.develop-online.net/news/41926/Funcom-lays-off-lead-designer-of-The-Secret-World

Bad news for fans of one of the worst MMOG developers of all time.

in related news:
http://www.theverge.com/gaming/2012...under-investigation-for-insider-trading-after

Aas was able to sell 650,000 of his 1.5 million shares when he left on July 2nd, with the company's stock sitting at $17.60. As of yesterday, Funcom shares are worth $2.17.

 

[Mangoose]

Aas stepped down to a strategic advising role the day before the company launched its massively multiplayer online role-playing game The Secret World. In removing himself from the higher ranks, Aas became eligible to sell his Funcom shares without having the sale publicly announced to the the Oslo Stock Exchange.

:D

 

[Mary Sue Leigh]

This wasn't so bad, but holding my breath for F2P as well.. I mean.. what MMO is THAT good that it can compete with all those free2play ones out there, especially with a 1:1 $ to € conversion? No wai. Except World of Warcraft maybe, that juggernaut may outlive me even by a few decades.
Since the option was there I've set myself up fullly for heal and support again so that means without getting a party in the limited time I had in my trial account, that was pretty awful to play alone. Seems like it has potential, if they do something about the eternally long load times and constant crashes.

 

[J_C]

This wasn't so bad, but holding my breath for F2P as well.. I mean.. what MMO is THAT good that it can compete with all those free2play ones out there, especially with a 1:1 $ to € conversion? No wai. Except World of Warcraft maybe, that juggernaut may outlive me even by a few decades.
Since the option was there I've set myself up fullly for heal and support again so that means without getting a party in the limited time I had in my trial account, that was pretty awful to play alone. Seems like it has potential, if they do something about the eternally long load times and constant crashes.

The loading times are short with 8 GB memory. And the crashes don't happen often now.

 

[Mary Sue Leigh]

Yeah my machine is a bit old and worn but it hasn't been so bad to be a bother, I just prefer my MMOs to tolerate being alt-tab minimized so I can chat, browse, shop for shoes etc on the side when I get too bored, multitasking mastery is a very mixed blessing.

Thanks for letting me know it got more stable though!

 

[Kane]

FUncom recently laid off 50 per cent of its staff after poor sales of its MMO The Secret World, and has since said it would work on smaller titles moving forward.

This is actually a sound move. Failcom clearly cannot into MMOs.

 

[J_C]

Thanks for letting me know it got more stable though!

And just when I said that, the game crashed during my session. But really, it improved a lot since the beginning.

 

[Mary Sue Leigh]

Dooh, I think I missed the 50% sale.. after all it is looking though, they may go down even further in the future. But I found out that the TSW guy also wrote the "Longest Journeys". I just LOVE the Longest Journeys (Okay, part 1, the second one was pretty silly and not well-playable somehow.. but you have to appreciate what they tried to do.)

So I'm not giving up yet... Haven't even had time enough in the trial to get any nice footwear. I hope it's not too much of a hassle/cost to get something nice looking.. Starting stuff was not too bad at least.

 

[fizzelopeguss]

A slash and burn sale might make me interested in trying it. £25 currently in shops and online...they're taking the piss.

 

[Minttunator]

Update #4 is now (sort of) online, though the raid is still closed for further testing. Most notably, they're trying to untangle the circlezerg that was Fusang, by completely revamping the reward system and merging the servers into a few Fusang battlegroups. The changes make a lot of sense on paper, but I haven't gotten to try them myself.

If they manage to more or less "fix" PVP and get the raid working, I think now would be a good time for a new publicity push and a sale to try and get more players in. The GW2 and Pandaworld hype seems to be finally fading and new major MMOs are still a while away.

 

[Rahdulan]

Going Buy2Play, huh. I guess it's a better choice than milking their players with F2P. Although I can't help but notice that those promised free monthly updates are now going to be sold as DLC.

http://forums.thesecretworld.com/showthread.php?t=62789

 

[J_C]

Although I can't help but notice that those promised free monthly updates are now going to be sold as DLC.

http://forums.thesecretworld.com/showthread.php?t=62789

You can't blame them for that. While there were subscriptions, these were free. I don't expect to give us everything for free after going F2P (buy2play that is). I hope this modell will turn out OK for them, this game really NEEDS to survive.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

I shouldn't be interested in this, especially after I bought fucking GW2 and played like 3 hours of it, but I am.

muh deep ones

 

[darkling]

I liked the free weekend I played of this and I planned to try it again when it went F2P or whatever, as long as the F2P part wasn't too shitty. When it was on sale for $5 a few days ago I passed it up because it was still a subscription thing and I figured the sales were a last ditch effort to get people to buy it before it went free. Then they did this and now I feel like an idiot!

 

[Minttunator]

I wouldn't worry about it, Darkling - I'm sure there'll be more sales around Christmas.

 

[J_C]

I liked the free weekend I played of this and I planned to try it again when it went F2P or whatever, as long as the F2P part wasn't too shitty. When it was on sale for $5 a few days ago I passed it up because it was still a subscription thing and I figured the sales were a last ditch effort to get people to buy it before it went free. Then they did this and now I feel like an idiot!

Think about how stupid the people who bought a lifetime sub must feel. XD

 

[markec]

I wouldn't worry about it, Darkling - I'm sure there'll be more sales around Christmas.

I doubt stores will offer more then 50% off since now sales will make very large portion of their income.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Amazon's gonna be selling this for $15 starting tomorrow. Think I might pick it up then. Watched this here video by this here MMO nerd and it looks appealing. Sure hope I'll get more play out of it than fucking GW2.

 

[Mangoose]

Did they get rid of combat and make Investigation Missions the only missions in the game yet?

On a serious note, are there a good amount of (decent) Investigation missions in the mid-to-late content or does it die out?

 

[Minttunator]

On a serious note, are there a good amount of (decent) Investigation missions in the mid-to-late content or does it die out?

They've added a bunch of investigation missions with the updates, so if you haven't played since launch you'll have maybe 10 or so investigation missions to do. Most of them are on Solomon Island, though, so it does dry out in Egypt and Trannyville.

 

[MaskedMan]

Amazon's gonna be selling this for $15 starting tomorrow. Think I might pick it up then. Watched this here video by this here MMO nerd and it looks appealing. Sure hope I'll get more play out of it than fucking GW2.

It's on sale now, if you end up getting it let us know what kind of key/DL it is and if it's regional or anything like that please. I'm a eurofag so I'm little wary of being dependent on amazon's download service in case they figure out I can't teleport at will to an Oregonian pizza hut...

Edit: Fuck it I got impatient and bought it, it just gives you a registration key for the TSW website, no bullshitz so far.

 

[Vaarna_Aarne]

No region things or the like? Should we set up a Codex group, I would be willing to give it a whirl in addition to my daily STO schedule.

 

[Rahdulan]

It's not region locked, although Failcom seems to be having some problems with those Amazon keys right now and some people had to get in touch with their live support to get it sorted out.